Fri 14th Dec: 11:00am Christmas play for all children and end of term (no lunch club)

Fri 14th Dec: End of term

Mon 7th Jan 2019: Start of Spring term

Pre-school Library

Please continue to enjoy using our Pre-school lending library. As you all know, books are displayed in the front hall every day. Encourage your child to select a book and log it in our big blue record book. Children love to take a book home to share and it provides a lovely link between home and Pre-school.

Operation Christmas Child

At Pre-school, we like to support some of the smaller charities and projects that help children. The Samaritan’s Purse project sends gifts in shoeboxes to some of the world’s most disadvantaged children at Christmas time. Information leaflets are available at Pre-school from Hilary.

Please note that Drop Off points will be open to receive shoe boxes from 1st – 17th November 2018. You can take your filled shoe boxes to the local drop off point listed below:

Administration

FUNDING FORMS

(only relevant to our families with children who are aged 3 and over on 31 August 2018)

During your child’s first week at Pre-school (or at your home visit if you are a new family), you will be given a funding form to complete. This form is provided by Reading Borough Council and enables us to claim for your child’s funded hours.

Deadline

Please return your completed form to Hilary or Amanda by Monday, 24 September, at the very latest, as we are working to a strict deadline by the Council. Without this form, we will be unable to apply for your funding for the Autumn Term and this will result in you being liable to pay for all the hours that your child attends.

IMPORTANT REMINDER:

Please remember that for every day your child attends Pre-school, the first half an hour is UNFUNDED. Also, if your child stays on for lunch on Fridays, this additional hour is also UNFUNDED.

For example, if a child attends 4 mornings per week (totaling 12 hours a week), 10 hours would be funded (2.5 hrs x 4 sessions) with the remaining 2 hours being unfunded.

INVOICING

Invoices will be prepared and e-mailed to every family by Friday, 19 October. The deadline to pay your invoice will be Friday, 2 November.

We kindly ask our families to settle their invoice by bank transfer if possible.Please note that we do accept Childcare Vouchers and if you are planning to pay using childcare vouchers, please e-mail our Administrator, Tracy Donaldson, to check whether our Pre-school is already registered with your provider.

VOLUNTARY CONTRIBUTIONS

St Andrew’s Pre-school is a charity and relies heavily on fundraising and donations to cover the cost of items such as updated play equipment, materials for craft activities etc.

On a termly basis, we kindly ask our families to make a voluntary contribution, to a maximum of £40.00 and this will be shown on your invoice.

It is entirely voluntary and there is no obligation to make a contribution,however any amount is gratefully received. Thank you.

Please note that we are unable to claim Gift Aid on VC’s paid using Childcare Vouchers. So if you wish to contribute, we would ask families to make a separate payment by bank transfer or cheque.

GIFT AID

We can reclaim Gift Aid from the Government on any voluntary contributions that we receive, providing that you are a UK taxpayer. By completing a Gift Aid form we can reclaim 25p for every £1 received. Thank you so much to all of our families who have completed a form. It is very much appreciated and makes a huge difference to us.

As previously mentioned, we are unable to claim Gift Aid on voluntary contributions paid using childcare vouchers.

SIBLING REGISTRATIONS

If your child has a younger sibling and you would like to register them with our Pre-school, please complete a registration form, by either downloading the form from our website or ask Hilary or Amanda for a paper copy.

Upon completion, please give your form to a member of our team, together with your non-refundable registration fee of £20.00, and they will forward it to Tracy Donaldson, who will e-mail you to confirm receipt of your paperwork.